Retirees who have the most money pay the most in taxes, according to a recent working paper, but they’re not necessarily rich.

“Most of the tax burden is carried by the top quintile of households,” Anqi Chen, co-author and assistant director of savings research at the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College, told Yahoo Money. But “it’s important to keep in mind that when we think about the top quintile of households — the top 20% — they’re not the super wealthy.”

Those in the highest quintile are mostly married couples with average combined Social Security benefits of $50,900, 401(k)/IRA balances of $325,400, and financial wealth of $441,400. When annuitized, those assets and retirement accounts earn account holders roughly $3,000 per month — or $36,000 per year — ostensibly making them middle-income earners, Chen said.

“That’s some money but not a ton of money,” Chen said, “and these households will have to pay about 11% [in taxes].”

The highest quintile pays 11.3% on their retirement income, while the top 5% is taxed at 16.4%, and the top 1% is taxed at 22.7%, according to the analysis. Overall, retired households pay 6% in federal and state taxes on their income.

Researchers used income data from 3,419 individuals and 1,907 households included in the Health and Retirement Study, a nationally representative longitudinal survey of older Americans. The analysis assumes the retirees follow the required minimum distributions for their retirement accounts and consume only interest and dividends from their assets.

Read more @Yahoo Finance